437 A Paragon [Part 1]
Northern sat in the embrace of the Void, feeling everything unfold. He wasn't seeing what was happening directly, but he had a sense that registered in his memory the things that Black Mamba was experiencing.
This was why he could sense the fear that crawled into Black Mamba's body at that moment.
The creature stood frozen, trembling with a profound sense of inferiority.
It was as if it had realized, in that single moment and without having to come close to the Emperor, the vast difference in power between the two of them.
And Northern could feel the same realization.
Black Mamba had an amazing ability—the ability to adapt. Northern knew it the instant the lines on its body changed, and its speed was boosted incredibly.
The creature had a body manifested to adapt to anything that was thrown at it, perhaps even surpass it. However, it was like a newborn infant.
It needed time to grow and evolve. Northern had hoped for nothing extraordinary by throwing the monster into the battlefront with the Emperor of Luinngard, a Paragon at that.
First, he wanted to buy time; second, he wanted to see what the Emperor was truly capable of.
However, all of that might not matter because, all the while, the Emperor had been playing with Black Mamba while Northern thought they had started a serious fight.
The pressure the Emperor was exerting insinuated that whatever he had been doing before now was probably child's play.
Black Mamba was probably not going to survive this if he didn't step in.
However...
He looked down at his gaping side. One side was open; the other was closed. The knitting process had passed halfway.
And he was sure he would be fully healed very soon, although he couldn't say the exact same thing about his stamina.
He was currently expending it to keep the Chaos Thread functioning.
He had an insurmountable amount of Void Essence; however, his stamina left much to be desired.
Northern breathed slowly and heavily as he anticipated what was going to happen next and thought of a way to stop it.
'Should I just send all my soul and Void summons...?'
Aside from the fact that it was not possible, Northern didn't think it would make any difference.
The pressure, he could feel its threat despite not being on the surface world. He felt like his head was shrinking.
Lower-rank monsters would probably die under it.
'Killing a monster with just the presence of his soul essence? Damn it, I really underestimated the might of a Paragon,' Northern mused.
He had always heard that they exist on a different plane than all the drifters, even an Ascendant. But he didn't really believe it.
Because Afkon was an Ascendant, and Raven, a Savant, came back alive.
He had almost thought that all the soul ranks were probably shifty representations of Ul.
But what a Paragon is shocked the hell out of him.
On the surface, the blazing crimson aura that surrounded the Emperor suddenly disappeared. In that moment, it felt like the world froze, then the blaze returned.
However, it was only occupying his feet, up to his knees, blowing madly like a piece of ragged cloth swaying in the wind.
The Emperor's ivory skin had darkened, like the remains of a body after it was severely burnt by flames. The blackness had not spread all over his body but instead spread in patches here and there.
He took a step forward, and immediately, his feet burned into the ground, turning it into molten magma that slowly eroded deeper.
The Emperor removed his blazing legs from the magma; despite it boiling and spilling, his leg was unaffected.
The next step he took was the same. And he continued walking forward like that, leaving footmarks of molten magma.
Black Mamba stood frozen until the Emperor reached his front.
It was so overwhelmed by the Emperor's might and fear that it didn't know it had zoned out.
So when its eyes regained awareness of being, they widened with shock.
The Emperor, with a stark, smile-ridden face, hurled a kick from below, smashing it into the creature's head.
A sickening, bone-crunching sound reverberated in the air as Black Mamba's neck broke. He oscillated in that position before smashing into the ground.
The Emperor, with the stark, smile-ridden expression, raised his leg up and slammed it down. But a black blur flew across the air microseconds before his leg decimated the entire ground and sent debris—large chunks of rock—flying into the air.
Black Mamba landed on the ground, tumbling and rolling away, unbalanced as it had put up its insane best to rush away from that attack.
The creature's sense of survival probably clicked, and it realized that if it didn't avoid that attack, it was probably going to die.
And simultaneously, inside the Limitless Void, a similar realization also hit Northern.
He touched his heaving chest, drops of sweat running down his pallid face, his eyes frozen on the ground.
There was no way, no way at all, he could survive a confrontation with a Paragon.
If he decided to fight the Emperor fairly, he was going to die.
That was certain.
Which was why he was not going to fight him.
'Well, it's not like I intended to fight him at all. The dude came out of nowhere and burrowed a hole into me!' Northern felt frustrated thinking about it.
How could he not have retaliated? He's practically on life support from one punch!
He sat back and settled, 'Well, I don't have to fight him. I can just let him know I am his sister's son, and he should let me live. Raven is the one he needs to confront.'
Northern was at peace with his line of thought. At the same time, he was quite conflicted because his intuition told him that...
Whatever scheme was going on with Rughsbourgh messing with the rifts in Stelia, the Emperor of Luinngard was certainly a part of it.